A Legendary Son of the New York Irish Diaspora | Robert John Burke

In this episode, we sit down with native New Yorker, seasoned Hollywood actor, and dedicated volunteer firefighter Robert John Burke. As a proud first-generation son of County Galway immigrants, Robert beautifully bridges the grit of New York City with deep Irish ancestral roots.

Pull up a stool as we dive into his upbringing in Washington Heights, the rhythms of the Irish-American diaspora, and unforgettable behind-the-scenes stories from film sets like Copland and working alongside Tom Cruise and Sylvester Stallone. We also discuss his deep bond with legendary FDNY figures like Father Mychal Judge and Captain Patrick Brown, and his ongoing work to support the firefighting community.

📌 Episode Breakdown & Timestamps
0:00:07 – Welcome to the Snug: Introduction to Robert John Burke.
0:01:27 – Growing up in Washington Heights and moving to East Northport, Long Island.
0:03:38 – The immigrant experience: Balancing a love for Ireland with making a go in America.
0:04:58 – Robert’s first trip back to Ireland in 1979 and discovering author Niall Williams.
0:06:22 – Traditional Irish music, tin whistles, and the global appeal of Irish Trad.
0:11:47 – Family farms in County Galway, traveling to Lacray, and winter turf fires.
0:16:43 – Family legacy: Growing up with a twin brother and three remarkable nurse sisters.
0:18:47 – The calling to serve: Firefighters, police officers, and Irish-American civil service.
0:21:12 – The volatile history of Irish assimilation in New York City.
0:26:22 – Crucial life lessons: Why we learn more from losing than winning.
0:29:14 – How Irish sensibilities, rhythms, and the oral tradition shape an actor’s approach to a scene.
0:33:55 – Working with Tom Cruise on a massive upcoming film and the post-9/11 detox initiative.
0:36:52 – Upcoming projects (Digger, Subversion, and returning to HBO's The Last of Us).
0:37:42 – Behind-the-scenes of Copland: Stallone, De Niro, Ray Liotta, and a carnival hammer challenge.
0:43:01 – The true art of a pub "session": Conversation, balance, and storytelling.
0:47:32 – Breaking down the stereotypes surrounding Irish culture.
0:50:27 – Taking a DNA ancestry test and tracking Norman roots.
0:52:57 – Meeting Captain Patrick "Patty" Brown and moving to Ocean Beach.
0:55:17 – Honoring FDNY heroes: The Drennan family and the iconic legacy of Father Mychal Judge.
1:02:26 – An Irish engagement at the Cliffs of Moher and the history of "Honeymoon" Mead.
1:04:36 – Committing to 24 years of fire service in honor of Captain Patrick Brown.
1:06:24 – The incredible impact of the Leary Firefighters Foundation and the Joey DiBernardo Foundation.
1:11:18 – The ultimate Irish Snug question: Imagining the perfect pub gathering with old country memories.

🔗 Support the Foundations Mentioned in This Episode
Robert talks extensively about the critical need for material equipment and advanced training for firefighters. Please consider visiting and donating to these incredible causes:
The Leary Firefighters Foundation: http://learyfirefighters.org
The Lieutenant Joseph P. DiBernardo Memorial Foundation: http://joeydfoundation.org

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Welcome to the Irish Snug Podcast. All right. So welcome back to the Irish Snug. If you are tuning in for the first time, please like and subscribe to our YouTube channel or whatever podcast platform you're using. Today we're sitting down with a native New Yorker and a proud first-generation son of County Galway immigrants. His life perfectly bridges the grit of the city with deep ancestral roots from decades spent sharing the screen with Hollywood's finest and bringing powerhouse characters to life to his dedicated service in the firehouse. Yet at his core, he is a man defined by his regular travels back to Ireland and a lifelong commitment to the people, the humor, and the traditions of the Irish American diaspora. Pull up a stool for a legendary conversation with actor, firefighter, and true son of the New York diaspora, Robert John Burke. Welcome to The Snug.

SPEAKER_01 1:00

Thank you, Tim. Great to be here. Thank you very much for having me.

SPEAKER_00 1:04

Yeah, I was uh very excited to get you on the show. I I've heard you had a very um you're very in tune with your Irish ancestry. And uh that's what we're all about is to sit here, tell stories, tell your story, what it is that really makes it, you know, uh, you know, home for you. So tell give us a a brief background where you grew up. I think you grew up in like Washington Heights, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:27

As children, well, let me go back a little further. My mother and father came to uh the United States. My mother came first in 1949, and my father came the next year in 1950. Um they were 30, my mother was 30, my father was 31, so they weren't kids, you know, uh uh per se. But uh they uh they settled in uh Long Island City, and then uh when they got married, they moved to Washington Heights, where my older sister Margaret was born, and then my sister Eileen and my sister Maureen um and my brother and I. We were born in a hospital called St. Elizabeth's Hospital on Wadsworth Avenue, it's not there anymore. And uh my father worked in the refrigeration warehouses uh on the docks. Um uh he was a bartender across the street. Uh the last place we lived was um 1630 St. Nicholas Avenue, um, and he was the superintendent of the building in lieu of these other jobs. Uh and then in uh 19 uh 69 we moved to uh East Northport, Long Island. He had the promise of a job uh as a uh church custodian for rather a large parish church, school, convent, rectory called St. Anthony's of Padua. And so we moved there. We were very happy to move there. Um, you know, uh it was a trade-off. It was the trade-off in my life, it it seemed like.

SPEAKER_00 2:49

Um we lived above how old were you at that point?

SPEAKER_01 2:52

I was about ten years old.

SPEAKER_00 2:54

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 2:54

My father would say damage was already done. Um we lived above three garages, three, a three-car garage. That was the surface area of the house. So it was very modest, but we didn't know any better. We were just happy to be out of the city, and uh, you know, that's where I I mostly grew up. We go back to this city, we go back to Washington Heights, uh, we go back to Inwood. Uh my cousins, the only cousins I had were on uh 204th Street in Dykeman, and then they moved up to uh Woodlawn. So we went back to the city, you know, all the time. Uh my father didn't like Long Island, you know, he didn't like America. My mother, my mother didn't like Ireland, so that was a kind of a it's not that she didn't like it. She just didn't think there was anything there for her.

SPEAKER_00 3:38

Well, those that's this is a everything that you're talking about here is such a common story. It's just a common story, you know, especially during that particular time. Absolutely. They didn't want to hear even hear about Ireland. They didn't want to go back. Yeah, my mother didn't look back.

SPEAKER_01 3:53

My father, all he ever talked about was Ireland. You know, he he he him and his brothers and his father, they had a thrashing machine. So oats, wheat, barley, corn, whatever it was, they would go from farm to farm. And it was a fun life. You know, nobody was getting rich, obviously. Uh, but my mother was the ninth of thirteen, so you know, three of my aunts on one side or were were went into the convent. Three, you know, and um there wasn't much opportunity, I think, post-World War II. And uh my mother, she trained as a seamstress. Um, you know, she had a cycle, you know, miles and miles to go and train and then miles and miles to come back. And she was a wonderful seamstress. When she came to America, she worked at an exclusive uh seamstress shop. So she liked it. She, I think she wanted to get out of there and make a go of things. And my father was just like he's more of a simple guy. You know, he he he liked Ireland, but I I guess he liked my mother more.

SPEAKER_00 4:50

Now, did he did he go back?

SPEAKER_01 4:52

Uh oh, yeah, he went back all the time, you know. Uh yeah. Um the first time I was ever there, you know, he said to my brother and I, Who wants to go where? And I said, Oh, I'll go to Ireland with you. I think my brother went to Florida, you know. So even before I had ever gone, you know, the stories that you hear that I heard growing up. We just finished reading um this author, his name is Niall Williams. He's unbelievable. And he writes these books, they take place in the late 40s and early 50s, West Coast. It's he's writing about Claire, but the stories are hilarious. It's about one story is about electricity coming to this town and how it upsets the town. And I when both of my parents came to America, neither of them had electricity coming into their homes. Um so these types of stories I heard as a kid, and then when you read them, a part of you hangs your head and cries, and the other part of you you know throws your head back and laughs. I mean, it's just very, very funny. And this guy's a tr just a tremendous writer, Niall Williams. So I I went back with my father. Uh the first time was 1979, I believe, the summer of and uh I was 19 my first trip, and uh here I get to see all the names and places and people uh that he had been sharing for for those many years.

SPEAKER_00 6:11

How old were you then? Nineteen.

SPEAKER_01 6:13

Nineteen.

SPEAKER_00 6:14

Uh on your first trip, okay. Yeah, yeah. So now before before that, growing up in New York, whether it was in Washington Heights or uh Long Island, were was Irish music or any uh anything like explicitly Irish in in the family household?

SPEAKER_01 6:33

I mean, I was like, Oh, well, like Sunday morning, uh Kill Nigel, uh what was it, um Malachi McCourt. So yeah, the the the music was in the house. Uh as the Irish should say, we we didn't have music. You know, we could play, but uh my father was a great singer. Uh my mother appreciated, she was a great listener. Um I dabbled. Uh I have three tin whistles at all times close by. Uh and uh my sister Maureen is a tin whistler, my niece is a fiddler. Um but we didn't have the music like heavy, heavy trad. Um, but it was in the house playing, that's for sure.

SPEAKER_00 7:12

And you know what to this day if I was to put on a tune right now, you would you would be able to I'm gonna say I I would recognize it.

SPEAKER_01 7:19

Yeah, and if you know if it's Sean No, if it's Trad, if it's you know, the modern day, we used to call it the Tura Lura Lura stuff. There's all different levels of it, of course, as you know, the instrumental, um, and then there's the ancient stuff, the real old stuff. So I I I still, you know, if somebody asks me in an interview, what what do you listen to? I say trad Irish. They're like, Really?

SPEAKER_00 7:40

And that's I got let my last birthday. My kids got me a record player. Uh-huh. And you know, it's like nostalgic, you know. So I got this record player. I I got rid of my record player probably 25 years ago at least. What a great gift. Uh oh, I tell you, I I pulled because I still have all my father's records. And you know, the Clancy Brothers, and yeah, like some real, like you were saying, the really old ones. I have a couple of really old ones.

SPEAKER_01 8:08

Yeah. There were the like in the 20s and 30s, they had these Cayley bands, you know, and it was instrumental. Uh one of my father's favorite bands was the Balinok Hill Cayley band, and they were a local band, but I think they recorded, you know, and it's, you know, heavy accordion and uh it's dance music, uh, by and large, uh, readles and jigs. Um, but uh it's great stuff. I mean, if if that stuff speaks to you, you know, at your core, that's what you like. That's I don't know how it got into me, but it did.

SPEAKER_00 8:38

So exactly. This is saying it's kind of it's part of your soul. It is very much.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

It it it uh i you know, I didn't grow up there. Um I l I love the place, I understand. But when you hear that music, it really just you know it's like yourself with the pipe band. Uh uh, how has it withstood the test of time? Other yeah, other things have gone by the wayside because they didn't have the strength or the you know the tenacity to hang on. But you know, things like Emerald Societies and stuff like that, like they seem to me to be getting stronger.

SPEAKER_00 9:11

Yeah. I I I hope it's getting stronger. Well, that's that's what my podcast is really kind of aiming to do is to really get this the I mean I the interest was always there for me growing up and for the people I hung around with. I guess in a way I'm just trying to see who else out there has that same tenacity to want to keep it going.

SPEAKER_01 9:32

Yeah, you know what's a funny thing lately I've been seeing? Uh Asian, Japanese, Chinese playing trad.

SPEAKER_00 9:40

Yes, that and uh and doing the Irish dancing. My daughter was an Irish dancer for so many years, and yeah, you'd see that as well. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:48

Yeah, uh my sisters went to Fashes when they were little. Uh there was an infamous step dancing teacher in our neighborhood. Uh so my sisters, all of them step danced. And um going back to the um, I see uh, you know, there's a Japanese band out there now and they're playing trad music, and I think they like the complexity. Um that's what speaks to them. Uh uh, you know, the 36 notes and the stitching and the coloring. You know, I think they find that fascinating and challenging as musicians.

SPEAKER_00 10:17

Yeah. Um I who was it? I forget who I was talking to last that they were in they were in Japan and they went to an Irish pub in Japan. Yeah. Oh, you know who it was? It was Joni Madden. Do you know Joni Madden? Sure. Um Cherish the Ladies.

SPEAKER_01 10:30

Yeah. There's her and Mary Bergen on the Tin Whistling Flute, and that's about it, baby. Close the book, you know. Yeah. Um Mary Bergen.

SPEAKER_00 10:37

She said she said she went to Japan and it was just amazing. Like who didn't know how to play? They had the trad music down, like it was.

SPEAKER_01 10:46

I think that's I think that's fascinating to me. It's like, you know, my I sent a a video. My sister Maureen is still, you know, she still takes lessons for many years, and um, I sent her this um Japanese guy playing some super, super quick jig, and and she writes back the bastard, you know, like this because the guy's killing it, you know. Um uh but yeah, no, it's it's fascinating that people uh you know, we sit here and we hear it one way, and I wonder how they hear it because they're fascinated by it and compelled to play it.

SPEAKER_00 11:19

There's there's a certain appreciation that's there, it's in there, and it I get it must be hitting their soul similar to the way it's hitting us.

SPEAKER_01 11:26

A very nice thing when when cultures, you know, transcend each other and and and and lock on, and uh uh I get you know, I'll appreciate different music from around the world, obviously, but uh but yeah, no, I've I've just been noticing that lately.

SPEAKER_00 11:41

Are you going back to Ireland regularly now?

SPEAKER_01 11:44

I haven't been back since tw uh 2019. In 2024 and 25, I did 14 trips to London. And my family was like, You're killing us. Like, what are you doing? You're flying over us like every week. It's a funny thing with movie business. Uh you're contracted to go to them when you're done, they stuff you want to play and you go home. You must not break your ankle or anything between now and you can't even cut your haircut, you can't do nothing. You have to maintain the same consistency uh during the film for uh continuity. And so I was not able to really book a trip to Ireland at that time because that would screw up the schedule. And uh, but I'll get over there. I get over there when they they don't nobody puts any pressure on me. You know, I often joke that I I never got to see much of the country, uh, which is the truth, because I would go and I would go to my father's place. See, my father had one brother, one of one of my father's brothers married one of my mother's sisters. So that's two brothers married. So I'm I'm killing an awful lot of birds with one stone. Like, oh, you know. Um, however, my trips would always be like five farms in one day, you know, because of the amount of cousins. And uh, oh, you'll have a sandwich here. Well, I just had 25 of them. Oh, you'll have, you know. So it became like brutal, like uh uh uh really to get to see everybody. Then we started to meet in the pub, and everybody would come. And then, you know, being the actor and stuff like this, they want to talk, they want to see you, they want to say hello, and and they know me since I was a teenager. So I never say when I'm gonna go, I just book it and go. And I just go, I I've gone in the winter, I like to go in February sometimes because it's a lot more chilled out. We were there two times.

SPEAKER_00 13:26

I I love being in a place when the when the turf fire is going and a summertime place, but yeah, I've been there when it was very frosty, like in December.

SPEAKER_01 13:36

Um, but yeah, because that's then you're having a real experience with the country, you're not just a fair weather, you know, stuck behind tour buses, you know, on some country road. I've driven in snow over there. Have you? See, that's I have never done that yet. Yeah, I don't want to do it again. Well, I'm I I'm gonna say you didn't have snow tires on that car. Probably not. Um but I when I go when I go, I sit in the kitchen of the farm. It's called Masonbrook. Uh I have one, two, three, four, four houses on that land that are us. And so I don't really have to go very far. And then it, you know, get out on the road, go around a couple miles to my other cousins. So they're all around this one lake. It's called Loch Ray, and um it's very central or east Galway, let's say. I know where that is, yeah. Yes, so I'm able to see everybody, you know.

SPEAKER_00 14:31

And if my my buddy Tommy, his his mom is from uh Ballinus Slow, which is not slow, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:37

Uh you just keep driving uh east, it's the next big town.

SPEAKER_00 14:41

So your story is very similar to the same guy, my friend Tommy, who uh he he he's gone to Sligo, where his his dad is from Sligo, and he he's gone there since he's a little kid. You know, he's always he spent all of his summers there. Wow but he's gone there so many times, you know, both of his parents are gone now, but he still has all his cousins and he and he's gone to Ireland so many times, but it's only in the town of Tuba Curry. He never has actually traveled throughout Ireland. Same same kind of story.

SPEAKER_01 15:13

I I've been to Clare, I've been to Kerry. Uh I spent good time in Kerry. Uh Kerry's gorgeous, it's a lot of fun. Uh, but my son has seen more of Ireland than I have. You know, uh there was a trip once where his mother and uh my wife Blair and my son Dylan, they drove across the country to go to see Dublin, the Guinness, you know, and Booker Kells and Trinity Church. And I stayed at the farm because I had to keep seeing folks. You know, it's not a it's not a chore.

SPEAKER_00 15:42

Well, you know what it is over there too, is everybody you don't want to you don't want to make somebody feel bad that you're not gonna be able to do. No, because then you get the biggest Yeah, yeah, you know, they expect you to see you. So it's it's like you have to you gotta fit everybody in.

SPEAKER_01 15:56

No, I would like to definitely see the whole country because I I follow these Instagram accounts and it's just remarkable. I was like, that's Ireland? Oh my god, you know, these beaches and ruins. Yeah, so I I definitely will, hopefully.

SPEAKER_00 16:11

I gotta keep some gas in the tank so that I can do that. The the last time that you were in Ireland, do you remember how well why don't we put it this way? When you get off the plane more in the more recent times, do you feel any differently than you did when you were younger? It's a very hard feeling. It's an emotional feeling. Right.

SPEAKER_01 16:30

Like the struggle all comes back.

SPEAKER_00 16:31

I know exactly what you're saying. Everything you're saying is very very similar to the way I grew up. Yeah. Very similar. Um growing up in you said Northport. East Northport. Your sisters did Irish dancing.

SPEAKER_01 16:48

Well, they did in the city. They were grown. Oh okay. They were all um my oldest sister Margaret was an oncology nurse at Columbia Presbyterian 41 years. My sister Eileen was a uh speech pathologist, and then my sister Maureen was burn care, Jacoby Hospital, early 80s, um in the burn center, and then she did uh nurse transplant coordination. I we joke, they have 300 years in nursing between the three of them. Uh they were remarkable, remarkably strong people. And again, that's almost the stereotypical Irish assimilation. You're gonna get an education, you're gonna get out of here, you know, we're gonna get out of here. Uh but uh and then my brother Billy, my twin brother, was in medical sales, like high-tech, super complicated medical machinery, you know, MRIs when they first came out, uh portable CAT scan. I mean, he did very high-tech, he could have been a uh a physician, no, no problem. And then there was me, I could barely read. But uh my father, we we had a we knew somebody in the police department, uh John Timony, he was the first deputy chief. And um we thought that maybe I would go there that way uh to the police department, which didn't happen actually, after my father passed away, because you know, he supported me to be an actor, but he just didn't understand it at all. At all. So uh you know, I think back on him and uh I didn't break his heart person, you know, but at the same time, he's like an actor. I mean, what the f what are you talking about? You know, and I didn't really come out and say it like that. I just started to do it, and it wasn't guys and dolls and uh you know this high school, it was different, it was a different path, it was um more practical. Then I went to a very good college for it, where you know, you come out of that college, you you are going to be going on television and in the movies, it seems to me. And he he passed away before any of that, you know what I mean? So uh and then I'll just skip ahead. It wasn't until 9-11 uh Pat Brown was a great friend of mine. Uh actually uh I'm sitting in a little room here, I turned it into an office. This used to be his room when we lived together here, and uh after he fell on 9-11, uh I threw in with the volleys here where I live in Ocean Beach and been doing that for 24 years. So somebody said to me, Burke, you're uh you're a first generation Irish from Washington Heights, you missed your calling. You should have been you should have been fire or PD from the get-go, yeah. But um I I and I enjoy that. I love that.

SPEAKER_00 19:20

Yeah, those those tight-knit neighborhoods uh did kind of shape uh people to an eventual path to becoming fire or cops, right? That was that was pretty common.

SPEAKER_01 19:31

You know, I think in Ireland uh it's a very funny thing. The guards are you know, they're kind of made fun of, you know. Any authority is really just challenged there. So when I think the Irish came here, they said, Oh shit, in America, you know, if you're a uh police officer um or with the fire brigade, you do get a certain amount of respect. So yeah, it's a very different characteristically, it's very different. I have a cousin who just became a guard, and I said, How does that work? And he goes, he goes, uh he loves it because he's in a very busy spot in Dublin where they are seeing tremendous spike in crime. So he's he's very busy. I brought him to ladder three uh when he was here. He had a great time. It is it is characteristically, I find it to be very different. Uh maybe it's changing, I don't know, but the between the guards and the cops in the states, it's a very different animal.

SPEAKER_00 20:19

Yeah. The I mean the when the Irish came here, that the others, the whole thing of no Irish need apply and the the jobs that the only jobs they could get were you know, civil service jobs. Right. So there's there's that aspect too. But that that carried on for s for generations. I mean, even when I came on, I came on FDNY in 1993, and I mean the firehouse I was in was I mean, they were mostly Irish. You know, if you looked at all the last names, so it still was there, you know. Did do you find that even like in the in the volleys out here?

SPEAKER_01 20:55

Uh yes and no. You have a very high complement of Irish and Italian, you know what I mean? But as neighborhoods change ethnically, uh you have different ethnicities who come forward and serve. And and and that's a a wonderful thing because that's a pathway into the American dream is to serve your community, uh, paid or unpaid. When you read the history of New York City, most costly, deadly riot in the history of the country, it was it was the draft riots of the Irish. Because I think they had had enough, you know, coming off of famine ships, half dead. Now it's like, here, take this gun and go fight him. It's like, what, you know? Um or if you're rich enough, pay that guy 300 bucks and you can get it. Well, I don't have any money, I don't have any food. So it was a it was a tremendously uh volatile assimilation experience for the Irish when they came here. Although for my own upbringing, I I'll say that there was a tremendous amount of uh uh there was it was strict, super strict. And I think the sensibility was if any of us screw around. We're gonna sink. So, okay, so we're not sinking. We gotta we gotta tow the line here. We gotta get out of here, you know, uh alive. You know, the last place I left was a basement in Washington Heights, and that wasn't so much fun. Anything after that was gravy. And yeah, I like personally, I very much like to see other ethnicities given these opportunities to prove themselves and you know and assimilate because that's the American dream. And if that gets taken away, then the whole idea of the country and what it stands for is you know liberty and justice for all, basically. But yeah, there was an inordinate amount of Irish, obviously, in public service, because it was all that was open to them. And uh and they were only too glad to step in and uh and and handle it.

SPEAKER_00 22:44

And even in like the older movies, like whenever there was a uh a police officer being portrayed, a lot of times he had an accent. Even if you want to look at like cartoons, you know, like Bugs Bunny, like the the police officer always had an Irish accent.

SPEAKER_01 22:59

To the point of uh uh what do they call it stereotype, you know, the big Irish cops. Um because that's what he was. He could speak the language, he could sign his name in English. Hey, give him a gun and a nightstick, let him go, you know. Um whereas other ethnicities coming off the boats didn't speak the language. Huge drawback. When you got off that boat and somebody says, Hey, you know, my buddy here is in charge of this neighborhood, and you're gonna be a police officer, you're only too happy to be able to do it. And you might get a free sandwich out of it, you know. I tell the story of when I was a kid, we had a bodega upstairs called Pops. It was like a deli, and a couple of cops would come in and they put their sandwiches on the counter, you know, and maybe a soda, and pop would just go, come on, come on. And oh no, no, because they want to pay. Come on, get out of here. And so I say, Hey, these guys are getting a freeze. You can't do that anymore. You can't take a cracker these days. But I remember specifically, uh, you know, at noon, whenever they would break for the meal, uh that pop wouldn't take the money from the police. Nobody ever broke in his store. Right. Because they'd sit outside that store at night where they were just, you know, that makes sense. It worked a couple of different ways, I suppose.

SPEAKER_00 24:14

So um do you have any stories, like stories that were passed down from your dad, like anything anything humorous or oh, you know, there was there was hundreds of stories.

SPEAKER_01 24:27

Um one of them I heard at my mother's funeral from my sister Maureen. Uh my sister Maureen you did the eulogy and uh and then it w it was substantiated by an aunt of mine. My mother had had an attack of appendicitis, and she was trying to get herself to the hospital in Galway City, and uh she got on her bike and she started to cycle 16 miles. And uh somebody said, Oh yeah, young Mary uh Dolan had uh I think she has the appendix or she has something, and they said, Well, she she can't have that because she just went by on the road. She said, Oh yeah, now she's going to the hospital. So she was hit by a drunk driver in 1976. But after my father passed, we took care of it like for 20 years. I had a tremendous relationship with them. I I I worshiped them, absolutely worship them. That's this that's the key that gets us through from leaving that country to this country is the glue, is the love, you know, and the respect. Respect even more than the love. Uh my father, he didn't care if you loved him at all. But you you were gonna respect him. Well, that was that was very common. Absolutely. Uh so yeah, no, they were wonderful parents, they were loving, uh, they would they were strict as hell. Uh, but uh as a child, I think you know, you you want to feel safe, you want to feel like uh they know what they're doing, we're gonna get out of here, it's gonna be okay. But like we never really realized that we had no money, you know what I mean. I who cares, you know. Oh, Jimmy's got a swimming pool. Oh yeah, like we moved to Long Island.

SPEAKER_00 26:04

Well, you don't know, you don't know. Uh exactly. That's exact I use that sentence all the time. You don't know what you don't know.

SPEAKER_01 26:11

I'll tell you. Even in the fire service, it's uh it's very prevalent because the more I learn, the more I know I don't know. You know, boy, oh boy, oh boy.

SPEAKER_00 26:21

Yeah. You know, when I was uh not that this is like maybe this is an off analogy here, but when I was a a youth football coach, I coached my son when he was, you know, seven, eight, nine, ten years old. And I remember one of the first practices, like the kids are all around there, and I said, first, first, you know, it's the first practice, and I said, All right, here, who who wants to win all our games this year? And everybody raises their hand.

unknown 26:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:47

And then I said, and I said, Well, I only want to win half of our games that we play this year. And all the parents are like, What? And I'm like, Well, let me explain. You know, you could win, you can go out there and win all your games and feel great about it, and and rightfully so, but you didn't really learn much. You know, you you could have won a few of those games by mistake, and you don't even know what your mistakes were. But when you lose, you learn from those mistakes. And transf transfer that over to the fire department. You know, from a teaching uh perspective, I always said that you know, gotta make mistakes, and hopefully nobody gets hurt while those mistakes happen. But those are when the biggest lessons are learned.

SPEAKER_01 27:30

I'll tell you, I've never learned anything from success in my life. Nothing. Uh nothing. And thank God I didn't get killed or uh die. But uh uh and that's just my life. That's not even the fire service. Yeah, so much of the fire service has been predicated from you know occupancy to outward opening doors to, you know, uh smoke that what have you. It's always based on tragedy, it seems like. Yeah, it's always reactive.

SPEAKER_00 27:57

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:59

And the day-to-day business of responding, it's always these little, little, little you know, I was reading, well, no, actually, some instructor was talking about, he goes, you know, we think it's the big things, the big things. It's not. He says it's an amalgam of the little things, um, in terms of your response tempo and and preparedness. You know, I I read a a wonderful thing a couple of weeks ago. 90% of what's going to happen at your next fire has already been determined. And I, boy, that was that's your training, that's your equipment, that's your bosses. I I it's it's shocking though, you know, the reality of that to really take that in. But uh to your point about uh losing half the games, I mean that's that's a that's a great thing. Uh because it's a life lesson, too. It's not just uh you know youth football. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:46

They're eight, you know, like you're not.

SPEAKER_01 28:48

I used to keep a pocket of candy with me on third base as a coach. I had I had how many mothers and fathers? I've never seen my childhood a triple in his life. You know, because he gets over Mr. Bark is gonna give him, you know, slip some candy on third base. And this is like a a bunt or a single that he just keeps running through the backs, okay, and and counting on the overthrow. But uh that was one of my little secret techniques. Get him over the third.

SPEAKER_00 29:14

I have a question here that I want to make sure I word it right. Has any Irish sensibilities or instincts ever changed your approach to acting a scene out? You know, like like maybe it's a phrase or like a trait that you saw in your home, like maybe you're even just your father's gate or something like that. You know what I mean? Any improvs that maybe you took to the stage?

SPEAKER_01 29:41

What a great question. It's probably one of the best questions I've ever been asked, and I I'll tell you why. My parents uh had packed dirt floors in their homes. My mother, and I'm sure of this, had animals come into the house during bad winters. They had no running water, no electricity. My parents' experience was similar to friends of mine in this country, great, great, great grandparents' experience. But that was not, that's my parents' experience. So these type of old rhythms and ways and customs were not far, they were only my father and mother, you know, passed down. Uh my sons joke to me when I say, you know, hey, listen, when I was your age, they're like, Oh yeah, back in the Mayan Empire. I'm like, you know, it's not because my upbringing was so different from any of my friends in Long Island, let's say. But when I approach a movie or a film, and let's say uh uh tombstone takes place in the 1800s, I kind of get a feel you know, there's no refrigeration, there's no ice cold beer, uh, there's there's there's cowboys drinking whiskey, that must make them psychotic. You know what I mean? So you start to understand the rhythms of the past. You're able to just separate modern day from you know a hundred years ago. Both of my parents would be over a hundred if they were alive. Um so yeah, I'm I'm always cognizant of the fact that no matter what role I play, like even when I go to Ireland, they say, oh, that's that's Johnny, you know, so and so over there. Uh that's packing, you know, everybody in the town, everybody is somebody. It doesn't matter if he, you know, if he shines, shoot, whatever, he's somebody. You know, and and so when you're building a character, you have to remember this guy is somebody. Plus the the language of the people. Uh they're very uh you know, obviously expressive. My father used to say the English taught us English and we taught them how to use it. Uh uh the adjectives that were used when I was a kid, powerful, mighty, you know, they would always put some if my father saw litter on the street, he'd say that's scandalous. And I'm like, how is you know, like, where is he why is he using these? They didn't have much, so they used their words. Uh the oral tradition, the shanky telling stories around the fire. Um when I was a kid going, well, when I was a teenager in Ireland and the pub would close, and then we go into this back room and sandwiches, more, more pints, more this, that, the other, and then guys would start to tell stories like grown men. And I was like, what? You know, so and one of them was even more scary than the next. You know, they were like, oh, I saw a light on in that house, a candle in the window. There's, you know, those type of like I don't want to say ghost stories, but uh stories about spirits. And uh I remember being shocked one night by this one guy and his story. I thought, Jesus Christ, is that real? I mean, like, I was I got the Willios. And then we were driving home at six o'clock in the morning, everybody's banged up, but backcountry roads. These three white horses pass, come out of the fog. And I'm like saying to my uncle, I'm like, is that bad? Like, but um, so to your question about just the sensitivities, the literature, the music, the culture of the Irish, uh, it's like one big radar dish. You know, you're an island. You you you're watching the world pass by you all the time. You read so I think it it heightens the sensitivities artistically, be it a painter, a dancer, a musician. Uh and certainly for me as an actor, uh uh, I think being Irish, my sensitivities, and we we're not even talking about the oppression, the 800 years of oppression. You know what that'll do to you. Um so given the chance to express yourself uh as an actor, you're you're just a lot more sensitized to who a person really was in life uh and what made them click, what made them tick.

SPEAKER_00 33:44

That's great. That thank you for that answer, because I think that's exactly what I was I was looking for. That's that's awesome. Great question. Are you doing are you still doing much acting?

SPEAKER_01 33:55

Yeah, yeah. I just uh I just came off of a film. I was hired for three months, the film went eight months. Uh it was with uh Tom Cruise. It's a big, big, big, big movie. We're shooting in Pinewood Studios, you know, where they shot all the 007s, and it was just historic. It was I was with him every day. More of a gentleman, I cannot tell you.

SPEAKER_00 34:17

You know, I I feel bad. Remember he there was right after 9-11. We were he he was doing a um he was doing he was involved with that whole uh detox thing. The detox thing. Yeah. So there was uh there was an event. I was at it. Okay, so I'm playing the bagpipes. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, we we played as people were entering, you know. Yes, and there was only like maybe, maybe eight or ten of us that were playing the pipes as people were entering. So Tom Cruise came in, and right when he came in in front of me, uh, he came and shake my hand and I said, Show me the money. And he goes, he goes, Show me the money. And then I said, Show me. You've never in the movie, how would you? Yeah, they go back and forth. It's like show me in the money, and I s but I screamed to my point. I actually had a few beers in me at the time. So I was probably a little bit louder than you know, acceptable.

SPEAKER_01 35:15

And he he kind of like he would have thought that was hilarious. He would probably tell that story later. And now he's he you know, you're kind of waiting for the other shoe to drop because he's such a big guy, you know, a big name, and you hear these uh gentlemen from the time he sets there in the morning. And I, you know, Timmy, I can't even convey to you shaking people, hey, good morning, good morning, good morning, good morning. It's like a half an hour to say good morning to everybody. I have a reputation for being a nice guy, but guys, I'm not that nice. You know what I mean? So he was just can't even say enough of the guy. So uh but I was at that event and I met him there and we talked, and um I remember Joe Higgins, I he might have been at 111 truck at that time, or I can't remember where he was, but he went through that detox thing, apparently. You do aerobics, you take niacin, and you go into a sauna. I figure you're gonna sweat stuff out that way, but Joe was saying that he goes, Oh, you goes, Bert Green stuff was coming out of my eyes because he spent a lot of time downtown. And uh, you know, he's an actor, he put up a couple of million dollars of his own money, and uh and guys went through it, and guys had very positive results. So God bless them, you know.

SPEAKER_00 36:23

I mean it was listen, I remember at that at that event, people there was uh there was like a white cloth there and and it had purple on it after they wiped their face.

SPEAKER_01 36:33

Well, God only knows what people were breathing down there, you know, because I mean the you know, this burning against this burning with this burn, who knows what that makes. You know, it was you know, the old hazmat guy would say, metaletal bad shit. Uh it was terrible stuff, and it's still in guys, obviously. But Cruz, you know, he God bless him, then he would do something like that. Oh, so anyways, uh that's it. It's a movie called Digger, it's gonna come out uh October 6th, I think. And then there's another movie called Subversion, it's with uh Chris Helmsworth, he's the guy who played Thor, and that's a um he plays a disgraced submarine captain, United States submarine captain, and I played the Admiral who disgraces him. Uh so uh those are just two that I finished, and uh we're waiting to hear on this other thing, but then in September I go back to Vancouver uh for an HBO show called The Last of Us. It was very popular, based on a video game. Uh it's the end of the world, people have a virus, they turn into zombies or whatever the hell. So I did a couple of episodes last season. I didn't get killed, and I'll be going back there in uh September.

SPEAKER_00 37:41

Okay. Yeah. You know what I wanted to ask you? You were you in the movie Um Copland? Yeah. You were so you know, I was too. Perhaps you saw my cheek. Were you piping?

SPEAKER_01 37:54

Perhaps you might have seen it. Oh, is that you? No, turn that way I recognize you. Jesus Christ. Were you piping in it?

SPEAKER_00 38:00

No, no. So in my old firehouse, I was in 75 and 33 in uh Bronx in the Bronx on Jerome Avenue. Yep. And this guy, Jimmy Grainy, uh, he owned like I'm gonna say 40 different cars, and they're all older cars. So all the movie sets, Bronx Tale, any of the any of the older movie sets, they would always use his cars. Yeah, and he had them all over the city in a this garage, that garage, this garage. But they would be used in all the all different types of movies. So he kind of had his hand in a little bit. So he got a bunch of us to do some extra work.

SPEAKER_02 38:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:35

Now I would never be an extra on my own because I it just wasn't my thing. But yeah, when we were a group, we would do it together. It was a lot of fun. You know, we actually, I was in SAG. I let it lapse. Oh, no, couldn't I let it lapse. But at that time we were doing um, you know, we were doing movie things all the time. And uh Copland, this is actually funny. So I'll probably cut this out, but we're we're doing uh Copland. There was a scene. I don't know if you were at this particular scene, but do you remember it was in it was in New Jersey, right? And it was uh it was a carnival scene. Yes, it was there. Carnival setup. Oh, right. So we're sitting there, and you know, the at any carnival, you know, the strongman thing where you hit the hammer and the thing goes up and hits the bell. Yeah, so there's there's five or six of us, we're all firemen, and we're all flying around as usual, right? We we're actually trying to hit this thing, you know, and it's girly men, girly men, you know, but we figure it out. There actually was a system of if you hit the hammer exactly the right way, it goes right to the bell every time. So now we're having a contest amongst ourselves. How many times you can hit the bell in a row? Bang, bang, so that's the stallone hears ding ding. He hears this, and he comes walking up the hill with his bodyguard was with him, too. Yeah, and but he approached us, so I guess we're now it's okay to talk to me. So he's like, uh, you know, now he wants to do it. And me, in my mind, because I got that fireman mind, I'd say, all right, we'll give it to Rambo and let him let him hit the belt. Girly man, girly man. Girly man is not gonna he actually got he got upset that he couldn't do it. Wow, and he turned away, and I took the thing, and all you as he was walking away, all you heard was ding, ding, ding, ding.

SPEAKER_01 40:26

That's great. You're too bad we didn't have the cell phones then to get a video of that.

SPEAKER_00 40:32

No video of that. No video of that.

SPEAKER_01 40:33

Oh, that's that's hilarious. He turned that too. He was a kind of a gentleman too, you know. Uh uh uh, you know, uh De Niro was in the movie, so it was like the two box office guys.

SPEAKER_00 40:46

Rayleigh Oda.

SPEAKER_01 40:47

Ray was Ray was crazy. Uh he did a very good job in the film. Um, I have a checkered story about that film. I had one role, and then the producer found out, and he he canned me from it, and he didn't want me in the movie, but the director wanted me, you know, it was all this bullshit that happened. Uh uh, it didn't matter to me. But um no, I thought I thought Sylvester Sloan did a good job in the movie.

SPEAKER_00 41:09

Uh but that's I think a low budget movie, and it and it did a lot better than they thought it was gonna do, or something like that. Maybe I got that wrong.

SPEAKER_01 41:18

What it was was Sylvester Sallone was used to doing these massive blockbuster budget movies, and here he is now, he's getting in the ring with De Niro, you know, and who I think he had to put weight on for it too.

SPEAKER_00 41:29

Oh, he got he swelled up.

SPEAKER_01 41:32

I told him one day we were in this bar in Yonkers. I said to him, you know, little Bobby Burke, I said, Hey, nothing for nothing. You're doing a great job. Like he goes, really? I said, Yeah, he goes, Oh, thanks, man. He goes, I don't know, I'm trying very hard. And I think a lot of the times people don't understand uh the whole thing about don't talk to them and everything, is like you could have, let me show you. This is an actual script. Uh you could have like you can have 21 pages of dialogue, it's in your head, and you gotta say it in a half an hour.

SPEAKER_00 42:00

And yeah, and you don't want to get disturb distracted.

SPEAKER_01 42:02

Oh, you gotta like put blinders on, don't talk to me. I if I you talk to me, I'll forget I'll forget my kids' names if you talk to me. So um a lot of the times it's that and the other times it's just nonsense, bullshit, but um, yeah, he was very nice, he was very uh generous, you know, bought hats and coats and you know a couple of the guys used to knock on his trailer and he'd come out and he'd say, What can I help you? And they say, Hey, Sly, can we come in and use the swimming pool? Oh, because his trailer was so big. But uh uh, oh guys, it's not that big. But uh he was very kind to everybody. He didn't uh raz anybody or go after anybody. Um and neither did De Niro. De Niro's like as quiet as a mouse, that guy. Uh uh very respectful. And he's always looking to see if he sees something that doesn't seem out of that seems out of place, that's wrong, or not, you know. But uh I was just, you know, as usual, soaking it all in, you know. Uh yeah. Couldn't believe I was there. I could never believe I'm there.

SPEAKER_00 43:01

Yeah. Well, that's it's good stuff. The the name of this podcast used to be Pubs and Pints. When I first started it, it was called Pubs and Pints. And it was really the concept of, you know, a conversation you would have in a box. Over a few pin. A session, which it still is.

SPEAKER_01 43:18

You know, it's funny because in Ireland, uh what I noticed was like you have a couple of pints and you have a good chat, you know, and or a good session. And a session is is is pint and chat. And yeah, there's an art, there's an art to it, you know. Uh my father would say about somebody who they either drank too much or talked too much, they didn't have the balance. And uh my father would say, There's no comfort in him like this, you know. It's like so you have a good old chat with somebody and you're you're giving and you're taking and you're listening and you're talking, you know. So it's uh the Irish uh that's a that's a very central part of the culture in in the pub anyway, uh, because the pub was so central for so long. Uh you know, it's funny, my mother Would look at pictures on Instagram or Facebook. I said, Oh, that's you know, that's Johnny. And she'd say, Are they drink they drink? Yeah, drinking, drinking, drinking. She said, And I said, What? She said, And it's so funny that she would say, She goes, We never had money for that. You know what I mean? They didn't have money. There was no money. So you didn't. I mean, Dad went to the pub on a Friday night, maybe or a Saturday or a Sunday afternoon, but uh the kids didn't, certainly. The teenage nobody had any money. My father would say, Jesus Christ, we had no money. My father used to tell me, like, he'd pick up some turf or something and and dry it out in his hat and then later s roll it and smoke it, because there were no cigarettes during the war either. So the whole prospect of it it's funny you say that.

SPEAKER_00 44:42

My um a cousin of mine back in 1980 di uh recorded uh an interview with my grandmother. What is that now? Forty 46 years ago, right? Yep. So I have that cassette tape and I it's now it's digital. But one of the things that he asked her in that in that interview was uh you know what it was like in her house. They you know what the typical two-room house, the hearth in the middle. And he's what would you know? What did you just do for fun? Well, we had parties and you know, people came over and be he said, Well, is there was there music? Oh, it'll be music all night long. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the dancing, oh, and it'll be dancing all night long. And um, and the jerk the drink. We didn't have any money for that. Yeah. You know, that that was so we they're having the greatest time singing, dancing, the music, whenever they're not drinking because they didn't have the money for that.

SPEAKER_01 45:38

My dad would say, you know, if somebody had a bottle, that was a big deal, you know, or they'd pass it around. Uh uh when I smoked cigarettes even uh, and I'd be in Ireland and I'd be smoking a cigarette, and then somebody would throw me one and I'd say, No, I have one. I'd say, you know, keep the you didn't pull out a pack of cigarettes without offering it to everybody. Uh but uh certainly modern day, let's say from the even the eighties on, uh, you know, young people having money to go into the pub is new, uh, from what I've heard. Um and then, you know, my father used to and my mother tell me that they'd meet at a crossroads, you know, two two streets, two borines out in the country and have a bit of music, you know, a fiddler, an accordion player and have a bit of dancing, step dancing. And and that was the fun, you know. You made your own. But certainly my parents didn't go into pubs when they were young and hang out and all all that. You know, even even St. Patrick's Day when I was young, you went to Mass. You didn't drink. My father didn't drink on St. Patrick's Day. It was a holy day of obligation to him. He went we went to Mass. Um, and even when my father retired as a church custodian, you know, he was the guy who took up the collection, brought it to the bank, swept the church, waxed, buffed, stripped the lights, the boiler, every he he took care of the whole place. So on most holidays, uh he wasn't a big dr I mean he he liked his Schaefer, that's for sure, you know. But he wasn't like a uh a heavy drinker by any means. He liked uh a shot of Seagram's or you know, uh uh Canadian club. He was a whiskey drinker. But uh I think I saw him a little tipsy twice. You know, uh he was big, he was a big, big man. Um but again the drinking was kind of a stereotypical thing. However, nowadays it's very pervasive in the youth because they have money.

SPEAKER_00 47:32

We were talking before about stereotypes, yes, and the whole the whole drinking stereotype. One of the guys that I had in my podcast is a friend of mine from from Derry. He came to America and he was here for ten years. But he says, Tim, you know, when I first when I first came here, he was bartending in Manhattan, he bartended at the Kinsale. And he says, Tim, he's you know, I come to America and I I never seen people drink like this in my life. Yeah, all they do is shots and shots all night long and shots. And he's a I walk into the bar and there's you know 500 different types of liquor up on the we didn't have that in Ireland. You know, you had three choices, two beers and uh or something else, you know. So it it that stereotype, you know, we're all Irish and we all like our Guinness, or we like I like my whiskey every once in a while.

SPEAKER_01 48:19

Yeah, yeah. The stereotype is a stereotype. I mean, you know, that was done to us.

SPEAKER_00 48:25

Uh it was done, yeah, it was done by design. Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 48:29

We were made to look like a apes, for goodness sakes. So where have we seen this? Anytime you want to degenerate a a society trying to assimilate, you just you just lay into them uh you know with the stereotypes. But uh, created a narrative, yeah. I remember I was in Iceland once and I was there for like five months, and uh the guy said, Bork, you are I said, Irish. Oh yes, yes. They had a whole island called West Mana Yar, mean the Westmen. We were the Westmen, and they would come down there and swoop us, the the Vikings, and take us hostage and put us on this island until we got our mind right. You know, it was called West Mana Yar. And he goes, Oh, you are Irish, yes. He goes, Yes, you are our slaves, and I'm like, I know, everybody keeps telling me this, you know. But uh but they assimilated them into the um into the Viking culture, and then the Vikings came south and said, Well, let's just stay down here in Dublin and these Wexford, these types of areas. And then of course, I'm a Burke, William de Burgo, William the Con uh Richard the Conqueror, William de Burgo, they said the Normans became more Irish than the Irish, you know, the culture, uh, the Brian Law, the language, the music. There's two sides to that, though, that they were inherent to the crown, but mostly when somebody gives you an entire province of connuct and says, it's yours, you know, have fun. Uh after the conquest, um, but you know, the Burke, Butler, Bowen, all these Norman names uh made a go of it. Listen, I didn't ask you where your people are from Mayo, was it?

SPEAKER_00 49:55

Or Mayo, yeah, yeah. We I have Burke in my family. Oh, yeah. Burke is a Mayo.

SPEAKER_01 50:00

Very prominent, yeah, anywhere in the West. Take a quick story. My wife is walking in Galway City, must have been 1990, and she's looking and she's looking and she's looking. I said, What? What is it? She goes, Everybody looks like you. The kids, the y'all guys, they all you look uh there's a distinct narrow, you know, uh you see it in the pictures of the Aaron and and and things like that, but I thought that was very funny. I said, That's very that's very um stereo racist of you, honey.

SPEAKER_00 50:27

Have you ever uh thought of doing the ancestry thing, like the DNA?

SPEAKER_01 50:31

Oh, I did, yeah, I've done it. We've I uh my son came out on the deck 20 years ago when it was new, and he and I said what? And he goes, Well, that was a waste of 200 bucks, and he he threw me the result. Uh you know, the middle of the middle of the middle of my father and mother's town, uh 500 years, and if you want to go back further, you gotta fork over another 200 bucks, I suppose, but there was no need. You know, uh 98% Irish, 1% Scandinavian, and zero and one other percent unknown.

SPEAKER_00 51:02

Yeah, that's that's the same thing I got.

SPEAKER_01 51:04

So it's like my son said he's. Yeah. Oh no, kidding. When the Norman Conquest happened, if you know, I really didn't have a last name. I was Mac, son of James, let's say. But yeah, after the Norman Conquest, and if I swear allegiance to De Burgo, William the Conqueror, then I'm of Burke. So I become a Burke that way. Not genetically per se. You were gonna take the the name of the the king or or be of his clan, let's say. Uh you didn't have to necessarily be related to the guy to uh say, hey, I'm with him. You know, so right, right. Do you golf? You know, I don't. I don't get into it. So you don't have the time. You don't have time. I I I do, but I I never I never did. I remember there was a priest named Monsignor Judge, Tommy Judge. He was one of the nicest guys in the world. He took my father and I out behind the school once, big grass field, and he said, Bill, hit this golf ball. So my father hit it like a hurley. He drove the ball. This is a true story. He drove the ball into a new housing development and broke a window. We heard the crash, and my father and I, and my brother were looking at this, and the judge is picking up the golf clubs. He goes, Come on, we gotta get the hell out of here. He says, Yeah, that must have been 300, you know, he he was he was because this ball took off whatever my my father probably could never duplicate that shot again. But the way he'd everybody else's father would hit a baseball by throwing the baseball up and then swinging. My father would throw it down like a like a hurley slither, and I mean this thing would take off like so it was funny. But no, I never did golf. My brother Billy is a great golfer, apparently. I went with him once. You know, I I didn't care for it.

SPEAKER_00 52:54

How did you uh how did you actually connect with Patty Brown? How how where where did that come from?

SPEAKER_01 52:59

Uh family friends, you know. I I think uh we ran into each other. We had a a mutual friend, this guy Frankie, who was a uh restaurant owner downtown, and we just started to knock around together. And uh uh I worked in a club as a uh a bouncer, believe it or not, on 14th Street, and Patty knew the manager of the place, a guy Billy Gilroy, Jimmy Gilroy, and they were from downtown, and they were like uh how do I describe it? Put it this way Patty's father was an FBI agent. Billy and Jimmy's father, I think, was a loan shark. My father was just a working stiff. So all of our fathers worked on the docks in some capacity or other. Anyway, Patty and I just knocked around together, and um at that time I was a uh a contractor, a uh you know, painting, plastering, uh uh carpentry, whatever you needed done, I would tell you that I could do it, and then I would figure out how to do it. Just to pay the rent, I suppose. Uh and then in 1990, I got back into the acting game and I rented this well, a buddy of mine was renting this house. Five rooms. You get a room, you get a room, you get a room, and we're gonna rent it for the summer. Beautiful, secluded. Uh the beach is right here. And um, and I said to Patty, hey, you want a room? And he goes, Yeah, sure, how much? I said, like fourteen hundred dollars. You get it from April until November. It's a it's a steal. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So he he threw in for I suppose five years in a row. This was his this was his little room here. And um then in 1995, no, 1996, I bought this house. I remember the first time I looked at this place, I said, Who could own a house like this? Nobody there were no homeowners in my family. Actually, my sisters did, of course. But uh my parents never owned a home. Uh yeah, Pat and I became, and then he says, Hey, do you mind if I put you down next to the kin? Uh yeah, whatever. His brother at that point was living in Las Vegas, his sister was in uh Westbury. You know, we knocked around. He was the um the godfather of my second son, Dylan. You know, we were just buddies. And so, but the funny thing is, when he when we hung around first, I was just a contractor, you know. I wasn't even in, I'd never done a movie or anything like that. And uh then he used to get a big kick out of the fact that I was starting to do the acting and um yeah, uh he almost did you know John Drennan as well? I didn't know John. No, I I got to know Vena pretty good. You did. I don't know, that was a whole kind of sensitive thing too. Uh, why is Patty Brown taking care of the the Drennan family? Why is in that particular house? And what it was, it was kind of a mutual, you know, Vena said, Oh, I'll I sign off on Pat. And he didn't have kids, he didn't have a wife, he had to go home. He could devote his whole time and his whole detail to John. And like if Patty Brown's telling you something in that hospital, get this done, get the you're gonna get it done. Um, he wasn't like a tough guy, but he had the respect, I think, of the membership to expedite things for the family. Um so uh, but Vina was just such a fantastic human being, and the kids, the girls, and John, the young John, and um, you know, uh it was a terrible time, you know, it was an awful, awful, awful time.

SPEAKER_00 56:07

Uh uh uh Wat Street was 1994. Yeah. And in it was uh 1997, so it would have been three years later, um, the band, the bike, the pipe band, we had organized a trip to Ireland, and it was open to the whole job, friends, family, you know, that kind of a thing. And I think we had like two, we might have had two or three busloads of people. So, you know, for either 80 or 100, you know, say a hundred people.

SPEAKER_02 56:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 56:38

And Vina was on that trip with us. And uh on that trip is when I proposed to my wife in Ireland. Oh my gosh. And Vina was there, and Jay, she thought this, she was like, was Father Mike with you? Uh Father Mike did not go on that trip, but I do have a I have I have a funny part to that story.

SPEAKER_01 56:57

Is that you with with Liam in the picture with Father Mike? It is. Yeah, that's what they see. That's one of the most iconic photos.

SPEAKER_00 57:04

I definitely used that picture in his book.

SPEAKER_01 57:07

Oh, the Book of Michael. Father Mike was great. He was just he he was to have baptized my second child, and then he called me. He says, I'm he had to go upstate. Uh, he says, Bob, I said, I know what you're gonna say. I said, I had it on somebody in the on-deck circle. Don't don't worry about it.

SPEAKER_00 57:22

He m he married me and my wife. Oh, no kidding. Where did where were you married, Tim? St. Sebastian's in Woodside. Oh, no kidding. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 57:31

Woodside, Queens, huh?

SPEAKER_00 57:33

Well, so that was part of the funny story, is when we got back from Ireland, he was not on the Ireland trip, but when we got back from Ireland, it was only we were only I think we were only home two or three days. And uh, you know, there's a there's a firehouse right across the street from St. Francis and um 24 and water, yeah. Yeah, yeah. We were playing the pipes at something. It was a plaque dedication or something there. And I went up to him and I said, uh, Father Mike, I got a question to ask you. And he says, Timmy, I'd be honored. Oh, he knew what I was gonna ask him.

SPEAKER_01 58:08

I knew him like a couple of years before I knew he was a priest.

SPEAKER_00 58:12

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_01 58:13

Yeah. So Patty was like, hey, listen, we're going out for a bite to eat at this diner. Uh my buddy Mike is gonna be there. And I'm like, okay, so there's this guy, he's got like a little Eisenhower jacket and a little cap on. He's he, I thought he was some retired like executive from like Wall Street. I didn't know who he was. White hair and perfect hair. Oh, forget about it. And uh he says, now, Bob, uh, your family is from Galway? Yes. Oh, my parents, I don't know, it was from Leitrim or I can't remember. But uh he was talking once about his sister Dipna, and I says, Oh, we have we have four or five of them, you know, and he ha ha ha. So we would have fun. We, you know, uh, but I never really asked the guy, you know. Then one day I was I was on 31st Street, and here he comes in the in the in the brown, he was a Franciscan priest, which I didn't know they even had priests in Franciscan. I thought it was just um you know, friars and um brothers, and uh he's like, Hey, how are you? I says, Oh my god, how are you doing? And uh he goes, You like it? And I say, Yeah, you look great. What a gentleman. Uh uh I remember Pat would have a bad time sometimes with a little bit of depression after uh John Dredd, and certainly after uh poor Peter McLachlan. And uh uh uh I would call Mike and I'd say and I didn't call him Father Mike, I called him Mike, to tell you the truth. And I'd say, hey, listen, Mike, can you can you give Pat a call? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Patty's number, 677-5517. I still, you know, I still remember it. And uh I knew he would he wouldn't not answer for you know for Father Mike. He'd pick up the phone. Hey Pat, it's Father Mike, I'm leaving you back. Oh so um, but Patty was the best, Mike was the best. These were a tremendous order of of people. When Mike Daly got the Order of St. Francis at St. Francis of Assisi on 31st, so he invited me to come that night. It was after 9-11, and it was ostensibly the award was given for his reporting, uh uh, but it was given by the Order of St. Francis. And I forget who else won the award that night. Uh the bar was high with those people. That's all I can really say.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:16

That's a that's a really good way to to say it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:19

And they kept and they kept it high. They either maintained that level of professionalism and bravery and coverage, or they exceeded it. They very rarely I don't know that they ever went below it. And that goes for Father Mike, too. He he he pushed he pushed the limits.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:32

He used to call me, you know, remember before 9-11, there people were just starting to get cell phones. Yes. You know, they were just starting to get them, and I had one, and he would call me on St. Patrick's Day. So uh so Father Judge calls me on St. Patrick's Day, and he would always leave me a message, you know, as if it was an answering machine, kind of like yeah, it's just I wish I had this message. Oh God, I hear you. I don't know how I lost them. You know, you didn't know how to save messages on your cell phone back then.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:02

Well, you had to erase them because it would only, you know, it would only take up so much space as if yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:08

But he would say, Oh, Tim, you know, I just want to um, I just want to uh uh give you a little blessing for St. Patrick's Day. Now bow your head. Like now he's as if he was talking about bow your head and then he would leave this long prayer every St. Patrick's Day.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:26

Wow. Wow. He was uh, you know, when they talked about canonizing somebody, that I thought to myself, that must be all throughout the ages, what a saint is like.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:38

Do you know Father Chris Keenan? I'm sure I know Chris very well. So so I said that to Father Chris, and he said to me, Um, Michael wouldn't want that.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:49

That's true too. He's like, What are you kidding me? That's a waste of time. Go find some, you know. That's the humility, you know. Yeah, that's what the humility.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:59

Well, and that that was my answer. I said, but that is the humility, yeah, and he should he should have it because of that.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:06

Listen, they asked Mother Teresa, uh uh uh, you know, blah, blah, blah, and she says, no, I I never felt close to God. Oh, Jesus, what are you kidding me? You see, too many people are worried about being close to God. Don't worry, God's close to you. You don't have to be banging your head against the wall to find God. God will figure you out and and use you.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:26

We this this conversation started with Vina. Yes. And uh when I when I did get engaged in Ireland, um she gave me and my wife a gift, and I have it right here on my bar. Holy smokes. It's this bottle. This is now that's how how long ago is that? That was 1997. So that's 30 31 years ago, 30 years ago? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a bottle of mead. And she bought it. Uh so I proposed to my wife on the cliffs of moor. Yeah. And there's a little gift store there, and that's where she bought this in the gift store there, and she gave this to us. Wow. And you know what the mead is for? Well, is it it's during the the uh uh the ceremony, isn't it that they well it was it it's said it actually there's a whole long thing here that I can't read without glasses right now, but it's it's the basically uh mead is made out of honey. Yes, you know, it's honey based, and the bride and groom would drink it, I think, uh every every night for a whole moon, a whole month. That's right. So that's the where the term honeymoon comes out.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:34

Honey moon, yes. I re no, I know, I know, I I I knew this at one time, but I'm forgetting the particulars of it.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:40

But that was that was a gift from Vena.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:42

That's uh a picture of uh Vena, Father Mike, Patty, and that was at the Holy Name breakfast. Uh I guess I suppose the first one after John passed away. I met them later that day, because I took that picture for a a a nice lunch. And uh you know that castle, that little keep that's at the top of the cliffs?

SPEAKER_00 1:04:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:04

I almost dropped my son off of it.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:06

That's that's I'm pretty sure where Vina bought the the thing.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:09

Oh yeah. Well they have the big this is before the big gift shop. I remember being in Ireland once, and there was like there was no fence, there was nothing. You could walk out to the edge, you could do whatever you liked.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:19

And then when I that's the way it was then, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:21

Yeah, when I returned, they had the big like roundabout and the gift shop. Anyway, I keep these, these are the the good ones I keep on my desk uh of Pat and the gang. I have his uh Proby picture right here. So when you're looking at this guy, you know, and and you're a volley, how do you want to conduct yourself? If my fire service is in his honor, am I gonna be a schlep? Am I gonna be a schnook? I mean a slacker, or am I gonna be training, training, training, you know, training myself into into uh uh uh you know, I I really tried to dedicate and and and and my fire service to him and and never uh uh get caught out, you know, unprofessionally, or um this is my little stick of the my little piece of the fire service. I break off. Uh but I uh I was very honored to be able to do it. To do I didn't want to get a tattoo. I I don't have any tattoos, I didn't want to get an earring of this bullshit. So I says, do something that'll last a lifetime, you know. I I do wear his uh you know the bracelet and stuff like that because I like his dignity and his professional, I have to put that on every day and remember to put it on. And I've never, I think one day in 24 years that I I forgot it. You know, I just went somewhere. Or I lost it uh on a beach somewhere. Honest to God, that day that I lost that bracelet, some fireman to me was his last name. He goes, How are you doing? He said, Are you on the job? I said, No, my friend was you know, who's your friend, Patty Brown? Oh, they all do the same thing. I I remember, and you've got to hear the Patty Brown story. It's it's an it's a good way to live because it gives. Your life, such meaning, you know. Uh, yeah, I'm not living in his shadow or or trying to steal his thunder or live his path. What I'm trying to do is live my own, but honor something and someone who was worth it. This guy was a tremendous human being. And um, you know, uh, when you say never forget, okay, what does that mean to you? Because it means something different to me.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:24

Let's let's just talk real quick. Um I know you've you've been involved with both the Leary Foundation and the Joey D Foundation. Yes. Right. Uh can you give a little context on what they both are and and the roles you played at all?

SPEAKER_01 1:06:40

Well, I'm an actor, so that means I'm supposed to be like a half-assed celebrity, I suppose. I did the show Rescue Me with Dennis for seven years. He has a tremendous, tremendous vocation, dedication, and commitment um to the fire service. Having lost his first cousin, uh Jerry Lucy, Jeremiah Lucy, a Worcester uh rescue firefighter at the Worcester Cold Storage Fire, tremendously horrible. Six firefighters lost, two go in, two more go in, two more go in, and now you're the chief of the door saying no more. You know. So many, so many ways to break that fire down. Anyhow, so he starts his foundation in 1999, and when 9-11 happened, he was poised to start to help families in any way he could. What he saw more than anything was the need for training. So he was raising money to build training facilities. Then with FDNY, you know, he became very successful raising money. Uh FDNY he bought a high-rise simulator. It's that building on the right as you come into the rock. On the top floor, there's a flashover simulator. He bought a $750,000 mobile command post. Uh he endows the FDNY Foundation. We restored 14 of 22 firehouses in New Orleans over the course of uh 20 months. Uh Ray Nagan, the mayor of New Orleans, said it would take 10 years and $10 million. Uh, we did it in 20 months for less than 2 million with donations and hard work. He never came to one of the openings that we had. Uh then a couple of years ago, Chief D Bon Auto, the father, uh, calls. He says, Listen, we'd like you to help with the D Bon Auto Foundation. I was a little reticent because I said, I'm not really a celebrity. I mean, you want like a celebrity. He's like, and then Mrs. D asked, so I said, Yes. But um, I called Dennis and I said, Hey, listen, can you give these guys some startup money? And I tell the story. I said, Dennis says, Hey, Bert, people give me money for my foundation, I don't give it to you. So Chief D went away and he wrote a grant. Dennis decided to give them money. Uh, and I we found out how much money, which was an exorbitant amount. He says, But I'm gonna give you that amount every year for ten years. So the D Bon Autos were on their way, and whereas Dennis raises money for the material, uh equipment, thermal imaging, bailout gear, these types of things, the Di Bon Autos get out there with guys from your job and other jobs, let's say, and and train guys up. So it's one thing to buy somebody some equipment, as you know, it's another thing to train them up on it properly. Very complimentary relationship between the two. Twenty-five years later, 26 years later from the Worcester Cold Storage Fire, uh, Dennis is going as strong as ever. His he will tell you, my hope is that I go out of business someday, that this fed and it won't happen. Uh, firemen will, you know, the fire service is a funny thing because we get bailout gear, we get thermal images, but we also get lithium batteries. So that the danger is always commensurate with the level of innovation you can bring to it. Uh so his commitment is as strong as ever. I just tell you another story. Dennis said, you know, it's one thing to invite people to an event at night and they have hors d'oeuvres and they sign a check. He says, I'm gonna make them come to the rock, push lines, cut cars, repel, you know, do searches, get down and crawl around with the gear, you know, with the mask. And it's 10 years of inviting executives and other celebrities to come there. Sure, you can give money, but more importantly, you're gonna experience for one day, uh, you know, six or seven evolutions of uh of different things that firefighters actually go through. The next time that siren goes by, you have a little more skin in the game. And it's been entirely effective. Uh the feedback and and the the money that has been raised. And that money is is also shared with the FDNY Foundation. I cannot say enough if the if he called me now and said, hey, I need boom, I drop everything and go. Every dollar that Dennis raised goes out the door so fast it'll make your head spin.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:06

Is there a website that the general public can donate to?

SPEAKER_01 1:11:08

Uh Leary Firefighters.org. Uh Leary Firefighters.org. And then of course, certainly uh the Lieutenant Joe Joey Di Bonardo Foundation.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:18

I got one more question for you.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:19

This is true.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:20

This is one of the this is one of the uh I try to give this question or like a uh you know, a little I I turn it around a little bit here and there, but question is you're back home in Ireland, uh you're sitting in a cozy snug somewhere. What do you see around? Who's with you? They could be dead or alive. Who's with you? It's too home. Who's the second who's your second favorite?

SPEAKER_01 1:11:43

My father is there. My father's there, and his brother Packy, and then my uncle Johnny. My uncle Packy was famous for punching you. You know what I mean? Punching you ribs, punching you in the arm.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:52

And I mean, he's like, that's so not Irish.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:55

Oh, my I mean you'd be sitting there talking this way, and all of a sudden he punches like what? He goes, Yeah, you're you know, you're just like you know, and and it's funny, I'll send you a picture of me and Packy. I'm a I'm a not a big man at all, but these guys were just forget about it. It was uh I remember once when I was a kid, I was in the back seat of the car, and and I was like dying, these two big guys like crushing me. Um, but yeah, my father's there, and a couple of my uncles, certainly my uh my cousins, great storytellers, because you see, uh they're country people. Do you know what I mean? There's not really anybody who was from the city, and not only were they not from the town, they were not from the town either. You know, it's like they were they were from the country.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:37

Can you can you describe the smell?

SPEAKER_01 1:12:41

Uh well it's changed because you can't smoke in a bar anymore. Uh, but there's somebody's got a turf fire down, I can tell you that. Uh see here, this is turf. Yeah. Okay. And you can take a little piece of it and you put it in the little incense thing. You have a little bit of the old country smelling up the house, you know. Uh have you seen those things?

SPEAKER_00 1:13:02

Oh, yeah, I have. Yeah. Actually, you yeah, you can buy a whole brick. I came home with a brick one time in my suitcase. Did they stop it? Stayed in my attic for like no, they didn't. I had it in a plastic bag. I checked it. I never even thought about it. That was that, but that's like that was back in the 90s.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:20

Yeah, I in the 70s, 79, I went into the bog with my uh with my cousins uh Willie, Patrick, and John. They had to you know foot out some turf and stack it and then bring some of the dry stuff home. And I remember like at four or five o'clock, uh I thought it was like a black cloud coming at me, and I was like, that's blue sky. How is it uh they called them midgets, they were like gnats. And it I was like, they were in my mouth and in my ears and everything, and we they were putting bags over their heads. We made a run for the car. I said, Jesus, you can't, you know, oh yeah, they're really bad. But uh just to have that experience, uh I was with my father one night and uh I said, Listen, I gotta use the bathroom. And he goes, he goes, go out in the barn. I said, but is there a bathroom? No, no, no, no bathroom. I go into the barn and I I like drop my trousers and everything. And I light this lighter, and there's a cow like right here. I'm like, oh shit. You know, I I came home one night and I was so hungover, and the next morning I'm drinking out of the uh sink in the bathroom, and the bathroom door was open, and my cousin John passes by and he goes, Oh Jesus Christ, don't drink that. And I'm like, you know, I spit it out. I'm like, what? He goes, No, he goes, that water will sicken you. And I'm like, what it he goes, you know, it was rain water, you know, from a bucket. And then when I asked for milk, it was in a bucket, you know, in the corner, not in the fridge. Uh I remember eating one time and I I see this guy pull up. He's got the smallest car I've ever seen, and the biggest trailer on the back of it, and out comes this bull. And I'm like, oh Jesus, this is gonna be good, you know, and nobody talks, everybody just goes up the hill. So I'm walking up the hill and I'm like looking, and my uncle makes some weird sound, and this one cow comes peeling out, comes down the hill, and goes into the corner with this bull. And we're all going like this to keep the two of them together. Well, my father made some wink at somebody like this, and they broke the line. They started to move to the edges, and all of a sudden I look over, and the and the the bull is looking at me, and it comes running after me. You know, there was another time I took a shotgun off the mantle and I put two shells in it. My cousin Pat's like, Yeah, go ahead. You're the Yank, they'll let you do anything you want. And I shot the shotgun. The whole thing blew up right in my face. My father's like, What possessed you to do that? I says, Well, Pat told me I could. He goes, No, no, no, because that fucking thing has been hanging there for a hundred years. He goes, you know, it's just true. Yeah, I don't mean to, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:58

No, no, no. I I actually do have to uh I gotta get running. I'm going over to my mother's for dinner.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:04

Well, listen, I I appreciate uh you having me on. Um it's an honor. And uh, you know, guys like yourself who I've met over the years, it's always been just a privilege and an honor, and I I I definitely mean that from the bottom of my heart.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:17

Um thank you. I absolutely man, I'm I'm really glad you came. Um I'm currently building out this Irish Snug Cultural Network, right? Where where the voice of the network is this podcast. Uh the network, the network is meant to, uh it's meant it's gonna be meant to unite like pubs, musicians, artists, storytellers, organizations, and and what I call the keepers of Irish culture and traditions. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:46

I can I can send guys your way if uh if you can't.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:49

Yeah, no, I I I would love it. Um we're preserving the culture and the traditions through these stories. Yeah. You know, we with guests like you. Um, I really, I really appreciate you taking the time.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:03

Well, it's worthy. You know, it's it's honorable, it's worthy, and it's and it's something I'm deeply interested in. And it's it's my life. It's it's you know, it's uh I I don't apologize for it either. That's uh I was lucky enough to be born into, really. But anyway, Tim, I'll let you go. Uh all the best and and and thanks for having me on.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:21

Thanks, Bob. I really, really appreciate it. It was fun.